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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23839909">Hands touch, eyes meet</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/cumtogether/pseuds/cumtogether'>cumtogether</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magnus Archives (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Happy Ending, Museums, Pining, Sharing a Bed, even vaguer references to tim as an avatar of the desolation, hand holding, light-to-medium gore/violence, light-to-medium horror content, vague references to sasha as an avatar of the eye</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 19:08:27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>8,400</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23839909</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/cumtogether/pseuds/cumtogether</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“You think the gauntlet is haunted?” Sasha asks, clearly joking, but her smile fades quickly when she sees the desperate look on Tim’s face. “Oh. You do.”<br/>“Not haunted,” Tim tries to explain, rubbing at his forehead in annoyed panic. “Something’s just-. I don’t know. There’s something not right about that thing. You know the guy who owned it last gouged his own eyes out?"<br/>“Eurgh.” Sasha groans and screws her face up in a way that would be distractingly endearing if it were not for the fact that Tim was trying to prevent her from possibly losing her mind and stabbing herself in the face.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Tim spends a rainy Tuesday night trying to prevent a possession and deal with his crush on Sasha at the same time.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Sasha James/Tim Stoker</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>38</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Hands touch, eyes meet</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/kedaloco/gifts">kedaloco</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for a writing prompt challenge - no. 19: 'can i hold your hand?', suggested by my lovely friend keda who introduced me to this podcast and this ship! i hope you enjoy &lt;3</p><p>Title is from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gS9Q_cbr9d8">I'm Not That Girl</a> from Wicked the Musical (the song doesn't really fit but this one line does lol)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s raining. A lot.</p><p><em>Appropriate</em>, Tim thinks, since he really, <em> really </em>didn’t want to be spending his Tuesday loitering around the halls of the V&amp;A museum while John digs through their archive to find some ancient cursed ring, or whatever, but here he is. </p><p>“Seems like we just missed the worst of it,” John had said as they’d pushed through the revolving door, taking them off the street and out of the rain which, sure enough, had been getting heavier by the second. Tim had just grunted in response. The annoyingly cheery expression on John’s face, along with the air of stuffy pretension that seemed to choke the joy out of the room and the people occupying it, made him think that he’d actually rather be outside getting soaking wet.</p><p>Nevertheless, he wanders through some of the exhibits absentmindedly, pointedly not reading about any of the items and relishing in the small joy of being glared at by the security guards dotted around the rooms. He stops short of pressing his hands right against the glass cases - he doesn’t want to deal with Elias scolding him for getting kicked out - but it’s tempting. Just as he’s about to uncap his Pepsi and pretend to trip, only to <em> just </em>recover himself before he spills it all over a priceless hand-woven Medieval tapestry from late-11th-to-early-12th-century France, something else catches his eye. </p><p>The sun has poked out just far enough from behind the clouds to send a single, piercing ray of light through the museum window, and it bounces merrily into a case at the very back of the room and across a silver artifact Tim hadn’t paid much attention to. Granted, he hadn’t been paying much attention to <em> anything </em>, but now, with the sunbeam hitting the metal at just the right angle to send glittering reflections dancing around the case, almost framing it in a wide, hypnotic, rainbow circle, he can’t help but be drawn closer to it. As he steps up to the glass, he identifies the object as a piece of armour, for the hand, he deduces, based on his assumption that old-timey humans had hands the same shape as modern humans, but it’s embellished with jewels in such a way that seems unfamiliar even to him, with his limited knowledge of armour design. Curiosity sparked, he checks the information plaque next to the piece and reads:</p><p>
  <em> Diamond, amber, and topaz encrusted gauntlet owned by a knight of King William I, named Sir Christóphe de Lyon (1032–1070). According to local legend, he took it from the corpse of an enemy soldier following the defeat of the English at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, and wore it at all times, even when there was no need for armour. Shortly after it came into his possession, it was reported that he became paranoid, insisting that he was being watched, as well as frequently announcing that he could see into the minds of others. His behaviour prompted neighbours to accuse him of consorting with the Devil, and he was sentenced to be burnt at the stake. However, the morning he was to be executed, he was found dead in his home, having apparently gouged his own eyes out with a knife.  </em>
</p><p>Tim wrinkles his nose in disgust, and looks back at the gauntlet. The entire circumference of the wrist is wrapped with clear stones - the diamonds, he guesses -  and a gradually thinning line of them leads up onto the palm only to once again widen out into a circle in the very centre. The diamond circle has an inner lining of amber stones, arranged into a smaller circle, and within that is a circle of the topaz stones. Bright, impossibly blue topaz stones. In the middle of them is what looks to be flaky black paint, worn and chipped away by the passing centuries, but just visible enough for Tim to notice that the swirls of jewels on the palm of the gauntlet form the shape of an eye. He can’t help but think that the diamonds dribbling down the length and around the wrist make it look like it’s crying, and he shivers. Instead of dwelling too long on the shimmering tears, he looks back to the topazes forming the iris, glimmering and blinking with each miniscule shift of his head. If he squints, it almost looks as if the jewels are moving; they spin around in their formation, circling the faded pupil slowly at first, and getting faster with every second he stares. They’re almost a unified blue now - a single ring - enclosing around the paint in the centre so it looks like the pupil is shrinking. The eye winks at him, horrifying and beautiful. </p><p>
  <em> I don’t see how something so pretty could cause such harm- </em>
</p><p>“Didn’t take you for an early Medieval French military history kinda guy.”</p><p>The voice from behind him cuts so swiftly into his thoughts, and gives him such a shock that it makes primal fear rise in his throat, but when he whirls around, Sasha is there, smiling at him innocently. He forgets the gauntlet and the eye instantly. </p><p>“Sash!” he exclaims, in a voice embarrassingly high-pitched. “What are you doing here?”</p><p>“Boss wanted me to come over and get you guys back,” Sasha tells him, doing the amused little eye roll she reserves for talking about Elias, “or to make sure you hadn’t been trapped in an ancient cursed sarcophagus, or something.”</p><p>Tim giggles, but then pauses, a confused look crossing his face.</p><p>“Get us back? Why? It’s only been-.” He checks his watch, and blanches.</p><p>“Yeah,” Sasha says, chuckling at his startled expression. “The security guard almost didn’t let me in.”</p><p>“That’s so weird, I could’ve sworn it was <em> just </em> half three,” Tim says, looking up at Sasha then back at his watch. She just shrugs.</p><p>“Must have been enjoying looking at-,” she pauses to bend down and read the information plaque, “-Sir Christóphe De Lyon’s shiny gauntlet.”</p><p>“Uh,” Tim says stupidly, momentarily distracted by Sasha’s incredible French pronunciation. “I guess, but-. No, that can’t-.”</p><p>“Don’t worry, I won’t tell John,” she smiles. “Come on, let’s go get him.”</p><p>She grabs his hand, and Tim short-circuits.</p><p>Thankfully it’s only a short way to the door leading down to the archives, because with every second Sasha has her fingers locked into his, he feels as if either his hand will burn off, or he’ll have a heart attack right then and there in the museum foyer. He can hear his heart pounding in his ears at such a volume that he’s surprised she can’t hear it.</p><p>When they reach the entrance to the staircase, Sasha lets him go, and he draws his hand back and cradles it in his other one without thinking, as if it were suddenly something precious, and something worth treasuring. He thinks he feels the ghost of her fingertips over his knuckles, and brushes his own over them softly while she unlocks the door, gazing in unconscious wonder at a part of his body which, until that moment, had seemed perfectly ordinary. As soon as she turns around to face him again however, grinning, looking for all intents and purposes as if she’d just successfully robbed a bank and not simply opened a <em> STAFF ONLY </em>door, he drops both hands back to his sides and grimaces back at her. </p><p>“What do you reckon it looks like down there?” she asks in a conspiratorial manner, leading the two of them through to the top of the stairs and never taking her eyes off him as they begin their descent.</p><p>“Uh,” Tim says stupidly, head still processing the feeling of the joints of her fingers tucked safely between his, and the gleeful look she was <em> still </em>wearing, like they were heading down to The Secret Garden and not just to pick up their insufferable boss.</p><p>“I bet it’s way cooler than our archive,” she goes on. The mention of their workplace snaps him out of his daze like a slap in the face.</p><p>“A graveyard is cooler than our archive,” he grumbles, and she giggles, which sweetens his mood right back up.</p><p>
  <em> God, I’m in trouble. </em>
</p><p>They reach the basement level and make their way through the long hall, past a table laden with various colourful ornaments which both of them spare a glance at, and towards the tired-looking security guard sitting at a desk at the end of the room. </p><p>“Hi,” Sasha says carefully, and the guard jumps in surprise, eyes flying fully open.</p><p>“Oh!” she squeaks. “Sorry, must've dozed off there! You’re here for-,” she looks down at a register in front of her, “Mr Simms, yes?”</p><p>“Yep,” Sasha nods, smiling in kind amusement at the guard.</p><p>“I’ll just go and fetch him for you,” she says, backing out of her chair. “Feel free to have a look at the display table just behind you as you wait!” With that, she stumbles through the door behind her and disappears.</p><p>Tim and Sasha turn back to look again at the array of objects laid out on the table, then Sasha starts moving closer and Tim almost instinctively follows her. A small gasp escapes his lips as they reach it, for lying right in the centre of the collection, is the gauntlet of Christóphe de Lyon, sparkling as ever, even in the dim and artificial light of the museum basement. And then Sasha is reaching for it.</p><p>“Don’t touch that!” Tim yelps, the fear rising in his throat sending him lunging forward to grab her arms before he can stop to think about what he’s doing.</p><p>“Tim!” Sasha exclaims, eyes wide, her whole body jerking in surprise. “What-. Jesus, you scared me.”</p><p>“I-.” Tim breathes, realising all of a sudden what he’s just done and quickly pulling his hands back as heat rushes into his face. “Sorry, it’s just-. That’s the thing I was looking at upstairs. Remember? The gauntlet?”</p><p>“So?” Sasha says. “It’s probably a replica.”</p><p>“Yeah, but-.” Tim stops and sighs deeply. He doesn’t know how to say <em> I think that medieval gauntlet hypnotised me and literally made two hours feel like twenty seconds and is very possibly cursed which means the replica of it might be cursed too and I don’t think it’s safe </em> without saying- well. That. </p><p>“You think it’s haunted?” Sasha asks, clearly joking, but her smile fades quickly when she sees the desperate look on Tim’s face. “Oh. You do.”</p><p>“Not <em> haunted </em>,” Tim tries to explain, rubbing at his forehead in annoyed panic. “Something’s just-. I don’t know. There’s something not right about that thing. You know the guy who owned it last gouged his own eyes out?”</p><p>“Eurgh.” Sasha groans and screws her face up in a way that would be distractingly endearing if it were not for the fact that Tim was trying to prevent her from possibly losing her mind and stabbing herself in the face.</p><p>“Exactly,” he says. He’s forcing himself to ignore the way it’s glinting at him in the corner of his eye.</p><p>“You’re off your rocker,” she giggles, and it fills him with adoration and frustration in equal measure. If he were eloquent, he might have told her so.</p><p>“Sash!” he says instead, wincing at how whiny he sounds. Nevertheless, she throws her hands up in a gesture of surrender.</p><p>“Okay!” she scoffs. “I won’t touch. You thinking it’s cursed is more believable than my reasoning for you throwing a hissy fit anyway.”</p><p>“I was not throwing a-.” Tim exhales heavily, defeated, and she laughs at him. “What was your reasoning?”</p><p>“I thought you were like, concerned about it being fragile and that I might break it, and that a potential future exhibit would be ruined, or something more along those lines,” she explains.</p><p>“Seriously Sash?” Tim laughs. “Do you even <em> know </em>me?”</p><p>“I know, I know,” she says, shaking her head in mock shame. “I was going to say I thought you might have spent too much time around John and he’d influenced you to care about museums.”</p><p>“Now you’re just insulting me,” he says, and she gasps and grabs him by the arms as he squeals with flustered laughter.</p><p>“Tim!” she yelps, looking at the door to the reading room. Then, quiter, “he’s only behind that wall.”</p><p>Tim shrugs, and grabs the nearest object on the table.</p><p>“Hopefully he hears then: I don’t care if this priceless ancient artifact breaks!” </p><p>Sasha smacks his shoulder playfully, but she’s laughing. “We might <em> not </em>be able to touch those, you know!”</p><p>“Sash,” Tim says, tossing the thing - which a quick glance identifies as a vase of some kind - up in the air and grinning at his friend’s horrified gasp, “if a funky object in a fancy museum doesn’t say do not touch, I assume it’s fair game.”</p><p>“And if it’s not cursed,” Sasha adds helpfully, not taking her eyes off the vase lest Tim needs her to come to his rescue and catch it before it smashes into a thousand very expensive little pieces on the archive floor.</p><p>“And if it’s not cursed,” Tim confirms.</p><p>“Well,” Sasha says, surveying the selection and picking out a bright pink hat adorned with multicoloured feathers, “I think that is an excellent philosophy Mr Stoker”</p><p>“Why thank you Miss James.”</p><p>She giggles and places the hat neatly atop her braids, then lifts her chin and fixes Tim with a narrow-eyed gaze.</p><p>“So,” she says, putting on a silly posh accent, “do I look like an upper class Georgian woman? Or am I giving you more, Tudor duchess going to see a play at London’s hottest new theatre, The Globe?”</p><p>“Nice try, Sash. You know I don’t know dick about history.”</p><p>With a fond laugh, Sasha takes the hat off and places it on Tim’s head instead, over the top of his cap, and regards him silently for a few moments. He waits for her to say something, but she just looks at him, a small smile on her face.</p><p>“What?” he asks, giggling nervously, feeling oddly exposed under her gaze.</p><p>“Nothing,” she says softly. Her voice is almost a whisper - light, and gentle, while her eyes are intense and vice-like on his. Tim can hear his own heart thrumming in the quiet. Then, suddenly, “you need something to match!” She turns back to the table and scans the remaining objects, grabs a red wooden mask, carved to represent the face of some kind of demon, and offers it to him, sporting a cheeky grin. “Perfect!”</p><p>Tim takes it and holds it up to his own face. “Now I look like Elias.”</p><p>Sasha covers her mouth and squeals with laughter, hopping on the spot in devious delight, making Tim beam behind the mask. There’s no sound quite like Sasha’s laugh, and her mirth is made all the more enchanting in that moment because it was <em> Tim </em> who did that. The toothy smile stretched across her face, which makes her eyes crinkle up so much they are almost shut, and the joyful giggles that sound sweeter than the world’s greatest orchestra, are all because of him. He’d happily spend the entire day in this pretentious, morbid, <em> dusty </em>museum seemingly staffed exclusively by people who think they’re better than him because they spend their life looking at old teacups, or whatever, if it meant he could keep hearing her laugh at his jokes.</p><p>“He does look like he was born in the 1700s,” she says once she’s managed to catch her breath.</p><p>“You’re unbelievable,” he snorts, lowering the mask and putting it carelessly back on the table, smirking a little at the way she watches him practically toss the thing away with cautious alarm. “I obviously meant he looks like the Devil.”</p><p>“Can’t help that I’m an intellectual, Tim,” she retorts, looking back at him once she’s satisfied he hasn’t broken the devilish costume piece. “We can’t all be internet musicians in our spare time.”</p><p>“I write bangers <em> exclusively </em>and you know it,” Tim says, clutching his chest in mock offence. “Anyway, how can you possibly know what century that’s from?”</p><p>“Process of elimination,” Sasha explains with a shrug. “Here, I’ll show you. Pass me that mummy hand.”</p><p>Tim spots what she’s pointing at and picks it up, but before he gives it to her, he pulls his hand further up into his sleeve leaving the bandaged relic poking out so it appears as if the mummified hand is his. To his delight, Sasha giggles again, and when he waves at her with it, she does that cute little bounce on the balls of her feet that makes Tim feel like a cartoon character with their heart pounding forth from their chest, and eagerly waves back.</p><p>“And a good evening to you, madam,” Tim cries suddenly, in his best impression of a snooty upper-class gentleman, bowing low and doing his best to use the mummified hand to tip the brim of the feathered hat he’s still wearing.</p><p>“Why, good evening, sir!” Sasha plays along, curtseying daintily, perpetual smile firmly in place. “Where are you headed in all your finery?”</p><p>“Oh, the………….the club, of course, my lady.”</p><p>“The club?” </p><p>“Yes. You know. The club.” Tim thinks quickly. “The club for people with fancy hats, and mummy hands.” <em> Wow. Nice save, Stoker.  </em></p><p>“Sounds wonderful,” Sasha says anyway, amused. “Let my escort you, my good man. May I take your hand?”</p><p>Tim obliges, and Sasha suddenly falls silent. Tim’s smile drops.</p><p>“What?” he asks.</p><p>“Tim,” Sasha says in her normal accent, eyebrows raised, but eyes twinkling warmly, “I meant the mummy hand.”</p><p>
  <em> Oh. Obviously. </em>
</p><p>“Oh,” he croaks out, heat prickling up the back of his neck. “Obviously.”</p><p>“No matter!” The phony posh accent is back in her voice, and she grips his hand back, tightly, like she anticipated that he was going to try and pull it away. “Now that I have you in my clutches, my good sir, you have to dance with me!”</p><p>To Tim’s horror, Sasha tugs him forward so they’re standing chest to chest, and in one swift, graceful motion, brings his other hand up to her shoulder before dropping her free hand to his waist. </p><p>“Sa-,” is all he can manage before his brain and his vocal chords fail him. </p><p>“Are you ready?” she says, but she doesn’t wait for an answer, and suddenly she’s skipping in circles and pulling him around with her in a crude parody of ballroom dancing, humming some classical piece probably composed by someone with a long, complex, continental European name that Tim would stumble on but that Sasha would pronounce perfectly, and then he’s laughing.</p><p>The panic he felt mere seconds ago, when he made his fatal and humiliating error of giving her his flesh and blood hand rather than the clay and gauze one, and his even more recent panic of suddenly being in such close proximity with her - and not by some accident or mishap, she had <em> wanted </em> him there - fizzles away with each spin, allowing a frantic sort of delight to sit in its place. He feels dizzy, and he knows it’s not because of their spin-dancing, but because it dawns on him that he is frolicking around in a dusty, badly lit corridor in the basement of a museum in Central London, and with anyone else he would consider this an absurd and bizarre situation, but he is not with anyone else, he is with Sasha James. She - despite reducing him to a dumbed idiot anytime she so much as pats his arm - makes him feel calm. Her hand on his hip feels natural, like it belongs there. For a moment everything becomes a blur of white noise and the muddled, spinning greys of the basement; the only thing he can make out clearly is <em> her </em>. </p><p>The moment is shattered by the door to the reading room flying open and crashing against the wall.</p><p>“What on <em> earth </em>is going on out here?” John demands, standing in the doorway, looking far too ferocious for a man of his size. </p><p>Tim and Sasha jump apart quickly as if stung. Sasha, in her surprise, knocks into the artifact table, and instinctively slams her hand down on it to brace herself. The fury on John’s face dims for a brief second when he sees her - he clearly didn’t expect to see her there - but it returns just as quickly when he sees the now scattered state of the objects on display. </p><p>“We were just waiti-,” Tim begins, but John interrupts him.</p><p>“Good Lord, Tim, get that hat off your head,” he snaps. “Do you know how easily old clothes can get stained or damaged?” Tim obliges, but he does go while glaring at his boss hard enough, he hopes, that John can feel his eyes burning into his forehead. “And Sasha,” John continues, in a relatively gentler voice which makes Tim bristle for more reasons than one, “please put that gauntlet back where it was.”</p><p>“Huh?” both Tim and Sasha say in unison, Tim’s archivist-related chagrin vanishing as they both look down to Sasha’s hand.</p><p>Sure enough, she’s holding the gauntlet.</p><p>“I-,” she gasps, dropping it back on the table quickly and taking a few startled steps back, almost into Tim’s arms, “I wasn’t-.”</p><p>“Careful!” John scolds, dashing over to survey the potential damage. Seeing none, he brushes past both his archival assistants and heads towards the staircase leading back up into the natural air. “Honestly, the disrespect of some people-. Come on, you two!”</p><p>Before following him, Tim and Sasha look at each other with wide eyes.</p><p>“I must have grabbed it by accident when I hit the table,” Sasha shrugs with a chuckle, but she doesn’t sound as sure as she normally might. There’s a nervous waver in her voice which Tim has never heard from her, and it terrifies him a little bit.</p><p>“Must have,” he says anyway, trying to muster up enough confidence in his voice to make up for her lack of. “And anyway, as you said, it’s probably just a replica.” </p><p>“Right,” Sasha nods. It’s a jerky, anxious nod. “No big deal.”</p><p>With that, she turns her back on the gloomy archive basement and starts towards the stairs.</p><p>“No big deal,” Tim echoes, quietly, and goes after her.</p><p> </p><p>When they emerge from the museum, the sky has already turned indigo, and wispy grey clouds blot out whatever stars might remain visible through the light pollution, but at least the rain has stopped, and the glare of the bus and car headlights reflecting off the still water-slick road make up for the lack of starlight, in their own way.</p><p>John announces - somewhat awkwardly after his little outburst due to his usually non-confrontational nature - that he will be heading back to the institute for the evening, and, “will they be okay on their own from here?”</p><p>“We’ll manage,” Tim replies, grimacing at him and rolling his eyes at Sasha once he’s turned away from them and started off down the road. “Twat.”</p><p>“Leave him alone,” Sasha says, but she’s smiling. Her eyes twinkle in the dusk of the city. </p><p>“I’ll think about it,” he offers, but they both know he has absolutely no intention of doing so.</p><p>The two walk towards South Kensington for a while in companionable silence, letting the sounds of London evening traffic fill the air between them. As the sign for the Underground comes looming into view, Sasha speaks up.</p><p>“It’s getting pretty late,” she says, stopping just outside the <em> South Kensington Station </em> banner, “do you want to just come to mine for the night?”</p><p>Tim’s heart lurches. <em> Yes. Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes. </em></p><p>“No,” he says aloud, “I wouldn’t want to impose.”</p><p>“You wouldn’t <em> be </em>imposing,” she laughs, shoving him playfully. “I’m asking you.”</p><p>“Um-.”</p><p>“Come on, we just take the Piccadilly Line straight to Finsbury Park from here and then I’m almost right outside,” she tells him, and Tim just about stops himself from saying <em> I know </em>.</p><p>Tim mentally weighs up the pros and cons. On the one hand, his burning desire to see what the inside of Sasha’s flat looks like will be quelled, he’ll get to travel to work with her in the morning, and he’ll be spending a good chunk of time alone with her somewhere beyond the reach of the Institute and away from the prying eyes of Insufferable Boss One and Insufferable Boss Two. Plus, she’ll very likely force him to actually eat breakfast for once. On the other hand though, he might stumble and say something stupid, like, “I like you, Sasha”, or, “do you want to go out for dinner sometime?”, or, “I’ve daydreamed about us quitting our jobs together and moving into a nice flat in the Irish countryside together and getting a dog and changing all our contact details so no one from the Institute can ever bother us again”, which would almost certainly freak her out and make her stop talking to him forever, or make him the joke of the office, or both. Still, Sasha has frequently been heard bragging about how good her scrambled eggs are.</p><p>“Fine,” he decides, letting his heart win out over his head. “But you have to let me buy your coffee tomorrow.”</p><p>“Well, if you <em> insist </em>,” Sasha sighs with mock resignation, grabbing his arm and skipping into the station, pulling him along with her.</p><p> </p><p>Sasha’s flat is almost unbelievably an exact representation of its resident. It’s decently sized and painted in an earthy, cozy red colour, with a number of fancy-looking old paintings - all of which Sasha could probably name, credit, and date - hanging in gold frames in various spots on the walls. The front room and kitchen are open plan, separated only by a small wooden island, with three well-tended plants in bronze bowls dangling above it from a panel on the ceiling. A huge sofa, worn and well loved, which may once have been bright green but is now a faded blue-grey, sits as the centrepiece of the front room, flanked by a small bookcase on the right, a low wooden coffee table and then a fairly large television in front, and a huge white desk on the left. The desk is topped with one mug filled with a colourful assortment of pens and pencils, and another - on a coaster, of course - still holding the last gulps of the tea that Sasha presumably forgot about earlier. Above the desk is a corkboard, on which Sasha has pinned a mixture of post-it reminders to herself, souvenir postcards, and a few photos. Tim gets a small rush of glee when he sees he’s in almost all of them. To the left of the desk is a second, far bigger bookcase, which reaches all the way to the ceiling and is packed edge to edge with books on everything from bird spotting, to The Fifty Greatest Female Rocket Scientists Of All Time, and there are even more at the foot of it, held neatly in their place on the floor by two palm tree-shaped bookends. The excitement of finally being able to investigate Sasha’s interior and all the weird and wonderful little trinkets and bits and bobs that come with it is so all-consuming that Tim doesn’t notice her sneaking away to her bedroom and re-emerging in her pyjamas. When he turns, alerted by sounds from the television, she’s already settled on the sofa and patting the space beside her to encourage him to sit. They have a short but determined argument over where Tim will sleep - Tim insists he’ll be fine to stay on the sofa and Sasha tells him not to be such a white knight and that there’s more than enough space in her bed - which Sasha eventually wins, much to Tim’s trepidation, but knowing both of their sleep schedules, he’ll have a good hour or so to get used to the idea. Once his fate is decided, Sasha merrily jumps back up to get drinks for the two of them. As she does, Tim checks his phone, sees the time, and swears under his breath.</p><p>“Sash, it’s gone ten,” he calls over his shoulder. “Mind if I put the news on?”</p><p>“‘Course not,” comes the reply from the kitchen. “Go right ahead, Mister Current Affairs.”</p><p>“Shut up,” Tim says, grinning fondly at the nickname Sasha granted him when she discovered his penchant for hearing the BBC’s hourly news reports.</p><p>Tim flips the channel until he finds the familiar red BBC Newsroom. </p><p>“<em> -Earlier this evening was reported missing, assumed stolen </em> ,” the neatly-dressed anchorwoman is saying. “ <em> The V&amp;A is asking anyone with any information to please get in contact with them as soon as possible. </em>”</p><p>“Hey, come watch,” Tim yells, not taking his eyes off the TV screen. “Something was nicked from the museum today.”</p><p>“The V&amp;A?” Sasha gasps, dashing back to the sofa with a cider bottle in each hand and leaping into a sitting position next to him, miraculously without spilling a drop.</p><p>“Yeah.” Tim takes the bottle she offers him. “Imagine if it was happening while we were there.”</p><p>“That’d be so cool,” Sasha sighs, almost dreamily. Tim gives her a look. “Oh, terrible, I mean, obviously. It’d be <em> terrible </em>.”</p><p>Tim chuckles and takes a sip of his cider.</p><p>“Wonder what they took,” he says, looking back to the TV screen and scanning for any clues.</p><p>“Hopefully something that shouldn’t have been there in the first place,” Sasha shrugs. “Like an old Indian relic seized by the English in the days of the Empire, which is now being taken back to its rightful ho-.”</p><p>Sasha freezes with her mouth hanging open in a small ‘o’, and the two of them stare at the news report, which has cut to a clip of a familiar, and undeniably empty, glass display case.</p><p>“Isn’t that-?” Sasha begins.</p><p>“Yep,” Tim nods.</p><p>“<em> -This Medieval gauntlet last belonged to a French knight by the name of Sir Christóphe de Lyon, who acquired it during the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Originally forged in Northumbria, around the late 870s AD, this fascinating piece of armour has an incredibly unique and distinctive design for the period in which it was made… </em>” </p><p>Neither of them dare say a word as the correspondent continues his explanation of the gauntlet’s origins and history. They simply gawp at the screen, cutting between the man who looks far too happy to be reporting on a stolen relic, pictures of the gauntlet, and Medieval paintings of battles and butchered limbs and a man with an arrow sticking out of his eye. It suddenly feels very cold in the room.</p><p>“Spooky,” Sasha says finally, with a shaky laugh. </p><p>“Spooky,” Tim echoes, stupidly, but for the life of him he can’t think of anything else to say.</p><p>“Well, at least this means it can’t bother us anymore.”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>They both take a long drink of their cider.</p><p> </p><p>Tim decides to cut his news catchup short that night, and Sasha, slightly wearily, suggests they retire to bed. Pointedly not thinking about how old-married-couple that notion sounds, Tim follows her to her room, obediently but cautiously gets under the covers next to her, and spends a solid hour lying as still and straight as possible so that he doesn’t so much as brush against her, until he finally dozes off.</p><p>When he opens his eyes again, the room is still dark, the curtainless window letting in the dim glow from outside and creating just enough light for him to see after a couple of seconds of blinking and squinting. A sudden rustling of blankets and the feeling of something at his feet snaps him into full consciousness, and he scrambles to sit up, but to his relief, it’s just Sasha climbing back atop the covers. The relief does not last long. To his horror, she crawls - unbelievably quickly - up his side of the bed until she’s clambering over him, and comes to a stop with one hand and one leg on either side of him, looking down at him with wide, glassy eyes.</p><p>“Sasha-,” he says in a strangled voice, his heart thumping relentlessly in his chest and his mind swimming with a thousand possible explanations.</p><p>“I know you,” she says, softly, her eyelids drooping low over her eyes, her head bobbing very slowly side to side and forwards and backwards.</p><p>“‘Course you do, Sash,” Tim gasps, grimacing nervously. “It’s me, Tim.”</p><p>“No, no, no.” She shakes her head and laughs, but it’s not like any laugh he’s ever heard, let alone like any he’s heard from her, and when she fixes her gaze on him again she is somehow looking right at him and right through him at the same time. “I <em> know </em>you.”</p><p>“What are you talking about?” he asks, panic beginning to build in his stomach. He feels himself trembling beneath her. “Are you okay?”</p><p>“I know you,” she repeats. Her voice is slow and unrhythmic, like she’s talking while riding a horse along a cobbled street. It sounds almost <em> inhuman </em>. “I know. I see.”</p><p>“Y-you see? What do you see?”</p><p>Sasha grins, her teeth white and sharp and terrifying in the gloomy, street-lamp-lit room.</p><p>“Everything.”</p><p>A shiver runs down Tim’s spine. Her voice sounds multiplied, somehow, like more than one person has spoken along with her, and the word almost echoes, filling Tim’s ears and brain and engulfing him in pure, unrelenting fear.</p><p>“What’s happening to you?” he breathes, trying to wriggle her off him, but she has him pinned down tight. There’s no visible strain on her face or tension in her arms and yet Tim cannot move. </p><p>“I’ve been chosen,” she sighs, sounding blissful, looking off into the distance. “I’ve opened my Eyes, and now I know.”</p><p>“Sasha-.” Tim hears himself begging; feels himself reach the brink of tears.</p><p>Suddenly, her head snaps back down and she stares at him so intensely that he freezes even to the shaking in his fingers. Her black eyes seem brighter. Almost glowing.</p><p>“I <em> know </em>,” she says again, more firmly this time. “Someone else’s rage carried all these years in an iron satchel, but one which will tear and fall to pieces like the thinnest muslin if anymore burdens are added. I see it all."</p><p>Tim is stunned, and as he is, Sasha pushes one of his locs away from either side of his face, and cups his cheeks in her hands with a tenderness that Tim had longed for but that now terrifies him. Then, suddenly, she’s trying to poke his eyes with her thumbs.</p><p>“What are you doing?” Tim yelps, squirming under her grip and grabbing her wrists to try and pry her off his face.</p><p>“You do not see!” she shouts, again sounding like five people at once, pushing her thumbs with remarkable strength back in the direction of his wide, horrified eyes. “You cannot know!”</p><p>“Sasha!” he screams, thrashing in his place and shoving her away as hard as he can. To his relief, she falls backwards and lands with a soft <em> thump </em>on her backside at the foot of the bed, and by the time he has scrambled onto the floor and switched her lamp on, she seems to have snapped out of her frenzy.</p><p>“Whassha-?” she mumbles blearily, scrubbing her face and then looking up at Tim with confusion written across her features.</p><p>“Sasha?” he asks cautiously, approaching her slowly, heart still racing at what feels like twice its normal speed.</p><p>“What’s going on?” Alarm laces Sasha’s voice as her drowsiness fades into consciousness, and she sees the panic still lingering on Tim’s face. “Tim?”</p><p>“Don’t you, um-,” he tries, not really sure how to explain what had just happened. “Do you remember anything from the last five minutes?” Sasha shakes her head no. “Okay. Well. You were, uh-. Sleep...moving? I guess?”</p><p>“Oh.”</p><p>“And sleep talking,” Tim adds.</p><p>“Did I say anything funny?” she asks, her lips twitching into an amused smile. She evidently hasn’t caught on to the fact that, moments ago, she and Tim had both unwillingly enacted a scene from a horror movie.</p><p>“You were talking about knowing everything,” he tells her, and she makes a ‘well I do’ face which on any other night would have made him laugh, “and saying that your eyes had been opened, and that you could see and I couldn’t. And-.”</p><p>Tim hesitates.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“You tried to, like. Prod my eyes out?”</p><p>“<em> What </em>?” Sasha gasps, the accompanying laugh sounding slightly hysterical. “Are you joking?”</p><p>Then it’s Tim’s turn to shake his head no. “You’re stronger than you look, Sash.”</p><p>“I can’t believe I-,” she says incredulously. “Tim, I’m so sorry! I don’t think that’s ever happened before…”</p><p>She trails off, suddenly looking very upset. Tim moves back to the bed to sit next to her, her sleep-induced attack both forgiven and forgotten, and without thinking places a hand on her cheek. When she looks up at him through her lashes, he smiles at her in a way that he hopes is reassuring.</p><p>“Don’t worry about it,” he says softly. “I was more worried about you. Are you alright?”</p><p>“I’m fine, I-I think,” she mumbles. “My mouth is so dry though. I’m gonna go get some water.”</p><p>“Let me come with you,” he says, and she just smiles at him.</p><p>They go into the front room together and Sasha fills a glass from the tap while Tim waits, standing as if on guard, prepared to protect her from whatever might want to ambush her while she is turned towards the sink.</p><p>“Do you want a cup of tea?” she asks as she turns back to him.</p><p>“Go on, then.”</p><p>“Alright, I’m gonna get my mug,” she says. “Put the kettle on, would you?”</p><p>“Yes, ma’am!” he says, saluting at her, and she smacks his arm as she passes and sticks her tongue out at him.</p><p>Smiling to himself, Tim does as he’s told and fills the kettle with water, then flicks the switch to get it hissing. He’s about to call over to Sasha, to ask her permission to raid her cupboards for biscuits, when something freezes his words in his mouth.</p><p>“Holy <em> fuck </em>!” Sasha shrieks.</p><p>The rest of his body turns ice cold with dread, and he sprints as fast as he can within the limited space to Sasha’s side. To his horror, lying on Sasha’s low wooden coffee table, is Sir Christóphe De Lyon’s gauntlet, the eye at the centre blinking maliciously at them in the low light.</p><p>“How in the-,” Tim starts, but he has no clue how to finish that question and just leaves his mouth hanging open in shock.</p><p>“What do we do?” Sasha asks shakily, clinging onto Tim’s arm and sounding as if she’s about to cry. “How did that thing <em> get </em>here?”</p><p>“What’s its problem with <em> us </em>?” Tim adds, placing his shaking hand over hers, which are gripping his bicep tighter by the second.</p><p>“Not us,” Sasha wails suddenly, “it wants me. It’s after <em> me </em>!”</p><p>“Okay, that’s it,” Tim decides, breathing heavily, scrabbling in his pocket for his phone with his free hand, “I’m calling Elias. I hate to give him credit for anything but if anyone knows how to deal with this thing, it’s him.”</p><p>“What am I going to do?” Sasha moans as Tim finds his boss’s number and presses dial. She is crying now, so he faces her fully, puts his phone between his shoulder and his ear, and takes both her hands in his.</p><p>“Hey, hey,” he says gently, making his voice as steady and comforting as he can, “It’s okay. I’m here with you, yeah? And I won’t leave until we deal with this. I won’t leave you, okay?” She nods tearily, squeezing his hands in a kind of thanks. “Is it alright for me to call Elias?”</p><p>“Yeah,” she sniffles, nodding again and giving him a small smile. “Better for him to have it than us, right?”</p><p>They share a soft laugh, and then Sasha lets his hands go to wrap her arms tightly around him instead. Taking his phone from its perch, he circles his free arm around the back of her neck and gently holds her head against his chest, protectively, but also meaning to remind her that she’s safe with him.</p><p>“Now we just gotta wait for bossman to-.”</p><p>“<em> Yes, Tim </em>?” comes Elias’s sneering drawl from the other end of the line, making Tim jump and startling the two out of their embrace. Tim is too out of sorts to question how his boss knows who’s calling him, or why he sounds perfectly awake despite it being almost 4 o’clock in the morning. </p><p>“The gauntlet,” he explains instead, with as much coherence as he can muster, “the French armour that got taken from the museum. It’s here. A-at Sasha’s house, that is.”</p><p>“<em> Hm </em> ,” says Elias. He seems unperturbed by the notion that two of his employees may have stolen a priceless relic from a heavily secured Central London museum. “ <em> I had thought it might turn up somewhere peculiar, but I didn’t expect-. Well, that’s </em> very <em> interesting </em>.”</p><p>The urge to shriek through the phone rises thick and fast in Tim’s throat, but he forces it down, for Sasha’s sake if nothing else.</p><p>“Will you just please come around and take it to the artifact storage?” he pleads. “Or at least just get it away from us?”</p><p>“<em> Fine. Give me ten minutes </em>.”</p><p><em> And leave your crypto-bullshit at the door </em>!, Tim almost says, but Elias has already hung up.</p><p>“He’s on his way,” he tells Sasha instead. “Now, come on. Let’s get your tea finished.”</p><p> </p><p>They move to the kitchen and stay there, neither of them particularly keen on being close to the gauntlet, but even with the thing out of sight Sasha seems nervous, fiddling with her sleeves and darting her eyes sharply about the room every few seconds. As it turns out, she does have biscuits, and she gets through almost half a packet of bourbon creams by the time Tim has finished stirring milk into their teas. When he lays the mug on the counter beside her, she snatches it up and takes a long gulp, despite it being fresh from the kettle. After a few moments of silence, Tim decides he needs to speak up.</p><p>“We don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to,” he begins slowly, “but you said that….the thing wants you. What does that mean?”</p><p>Sasha sighs gently and stares down into the mug cradled in both of her hands.</p><p>“It’s hard to explain,” she says. “Have you ever gone somewhere, or seen something, or....met someone….and it just felt <em> right </em> ?” Tim nods, as he dare not answer that question out loud. “Like, there’s just some kind of invisible connection, and for better or worse, you kind of feel wanted. Or needed, even. Almost….this bond was meant to be. I don’t know. In the museum I brushed it off as, like, me being interested in the thing because it was a cool-looking historical artifact, but it’s not that, it’s more like….I felt it <em> calling </em> me. Ugh, no, that’s not right. This sounds stupid.”<br/>
“No, it doesn’t,” Tim assures her. “I think I’ve felt something like that before.” Sasha looks up at him, almost hopefully. “When I was a kid, I always used to try and walk into the fireplace. Like, when there was actually a fire in there I mean. I don’t know why, it just felt like something I needed to do. And I was obsessed with doing that thing where you lick your fingers and then use them to put out a candle flame, or I’d straight up stick my fingers into the hot wax. Somehow, burning myself made me feel in control.”</p><p>“That makes-, well, not sense, but-.” She trails off.</p><p>“You understand.”</p><p>“Yeah.”<br/>
<br/>
“Are you going to tell John?”</p><p>“Maybe.” They fall silent again for a few seconds. Then, “Tim?”</p><p>“Yeah, Sash?”</p><p>“After work tomorrow, would you-.” She hesitates, then takes a deep breath and continues. “Would you come back here again? And stay another night?”</p><p>“Of course,” Tim says immediately. “As long as you don’t try and gouge my eyes out again.”</p><p>To his relief, she giggles. Then she just looks at him, the twinkle back in her eyes, with the ghost of a smile still on her lips. She just looks.</p><p>“Sash-.”</p><p>She kisses him.</p><p>It’s exactly as she explained; it feels right. It feels like a more-than-physical connection. It feels like a bond that was meant to be. Not, as before, in a become-borderline-possessed-and-almost-commit-acts-of-violence-or-self-harm sort of way, but rather in an <em> I want to hold and be held by you, wrap myself up in you, adore you, and keep you safe </em> sort of way. In an, <em> I want you and you want me, I need you and you need me </em> sort of way. For that moment, nothing else exists but her arms around his waist, his hands on the back of her neck, and her lips on his lips.</p><p>When they hear the doorbell, they part, and stare at each other for a few seconds as the kitchen melts back into focus on the periphery, blinking as if coming out of a dream. Then, wordlessly, they take each other’s hand and go to the door.</p><p> </p><p>Elias stands behind Sasha’s front door fully dressed, hair slicked back as usual, his hands behind his back, with the irritating, ever-present, ‘I know something you don’t’ smirk firmly on his face.</p><p>“Good morning,” he says coolly, waiting patiently to be invited inside.</p><p>“Hi, uh,” Sasha greets awkwardly, “Sorry to bother you so late. Or early. Oh, uh, come in.”</p><p>Without a shred of urgency, Elias steps over the threshold obediently and follows Sasha through into the front room, leaving Tim behind to close the door. As he does, he spots a black cab parked in the street just in front of the gate, with a man sitting in the driver’s seat who looks more like a skeleton than a human being. Suddenly the man’s head turns and he looks at Tim,  fixing him with the same unblinking, almost acid green stare that Elias has, and the motion startles him so much that he gasps and slams the door shut without thinking.</p><p><em> Probably just one of Elias’s weirdo friends </em>, he thinks as he scurries to the front room, and tries to put it out of his mind.</p><p>Elias is making a beeline for the gauntlet as Tim re-enters the flat.</p><p>“Hey, you probably shouldn’t touch th-,” he yelps, but Elias has picked it up before he can finish his warning, making no indication that he even heard Tim speak.</p><p>“Lighter than I expected,” he says thoughtfully, holding it nonchalantly by the middle finger, not seeming to have any regard for its age or value. Then he slips it on his own hand, and Tim and Sasha look at each other in horror. “Hm. Smaller, too.”</p><p>The two of them watch as Elias slides it back off, both half expecting his hand to come out bloody or burnt, or both, but it re-emerges pale and white as ever.</p><p>“So,” Sasha says hesitantly, “you can take it?”</p><p>“Of course,” Elias grins, turning swiftly to face her. “The more important question is, are you sure you want me to?”</p><p>They stare at each other for a few moments, seeming to have a full silent conversation within that short time, until a kind of cryptic understanding which Tim cannot hope to grasp passes between them, and she nods, with certainty.</p><p>“Yes. Take it.”</p><p>“Very well,” Elias says, sounding ever so slightly annoyed, and stalks back, past Tim, into the entrance hallway. Sasha dashes after him as he re-opens the front door.</p><p>“What about the museum?” she asks just before he steps out, and he turns and regards her with a gaze that feels, somehow, heavy. “Won’t they keep looking for the gauntlet? They’ll come sniffing around the Institute for sure.”</p><p>“Don’t you worry, Sasha,” Elias says, bearing his teeth, only succeeding in generating a higher level of worry, “Let me <em> deal </em> with them.”</p><p>“Oh, sure,” Sasha nods, not sounding particularly convinced. “Well. Thanks for your help.”</p><p>“My pleasure,” Elias says. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I shall wish the lovebirds goodnight.”</p><p>With that, he turns and strides down the front garden pathway, and as he steps back into his taxi, the vehicle seems to groan and rust before their eyes, as if it has, all of a sudden, aged a hundred years.</p><p> </p><p>They barely speak once Elias has vanished. Sasha, with a tiredness that makes her seem ancient, simply mutters that they should go back to bed, and takes Tim’s hand back into hers. She leads them to her room and dives onto her mattress, shuffling aside so Tim can climb in after her, and almost immediately after they’re both under the duvet, she wraps her arms around him and puts her face in his chest. </p><p>“Thank you, Tim,” she says, voice muffled. “Love you.”</p><p>She’s half asleep and mostly incoherent, but the words still make Tim’s heart jump. In the two seconds it takes for him to process them, she has already dozed off, holding him close to her with a strength that defies even sleep, and with a gentle sigh, he finds her hand and holds it firmly.</p><p>“Anytime,” he says to her sleeping form. “Love you too.”</p><p> </p><p>They wake to the sound of Sasha’s alarm clock in a tangle of limbs, only just able to tell where one ends and the other begins, with sunlight pouring over them and gently rousing them from their drowsiness. Sasha sits up to stop the loud ringing, and in the daylight, Tim can see her black eyes glowing, but not in the sinister, wicked way from the night before. They shine and gleam with warmth, like a pool for the sunbeams to leap in and out of, as if she and the sun itself are great friends. Tim finds her hand within the duvet and takes it, and she turns to look at him, her face lighting up when she sees him gazing from his place next to her.</p><p>“What?” she asks, looking at him through eyes crinkled half shut from smiling.</p><p>He smiles back at her.</p><p>“Nothing.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>i am on <a href="https://twitter.com/cumtcgether">twitter</a> sometimes :}</p></blockquote></div></div>
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